I was playing around with my oldest Mac mini today (a “Mac mini (Late 2005)” revision), and one odd thing I noticed is the specifications sticker on the base lists the CPU as being a 1.42GHz G4, but it is actually a 1.5GHz G4 - turns out Apple did a stealth upgrade in the last few months before switching these over to Intel.
I wiped the copy of Mac OS X v10.5 that it was running, as I had found the correct “Mac mini Mac OS 9 Install Disc” for this machine and so wanted to install Mac OS X v10.4, as it was the last version to support running older Mac OS 9 applications through a feature called the “Classic Environment”. It is thankfully a rare application that doesn’t run in this mode - and with this machine having 1GB of RAM and a 64MB graphics card, most run quite well indeed! The Mac mini certainly takes up less desk space, uses less power, and produces less fan noise than any of the Power Mac G4 range, as much as those have a special place in my heart.
I should use this as my daily driver - things like YouTube not working would be a productivity enhancer! I can still search the web using Frogfind :)
Currently listening: “Zsauce, Jungle Here (Ambient, Jazzy, Jungle, 90s DNB Mix)”
